Nearly three months after the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) released a lengthy report that detailed allegations of doping (and months after stepping down as chairman of Livestrong, the cancer-fighting charity he founded in 1997), Lance Armstrong is said to be considering publicly admitting that he used the performance-enhancing drugs he has been accused of taking during his years as the world’s best professional cyclist. Why? He has told anti-doping officials and associates that he is mulling the admission of guilt, according to the , so that he can resume his athletic career.
Asked by the Times when Armstrong might confess, Tim Herman, his longtime lawyer, said: “I do not know about that. I suppose anything is possible, for sure. Right now, that’s really not on the table.” But before Armstrong can come clean, he will have to settle a number of open cases, including a federal whistle-blower case “in which he and several team officials from Armstrong’s United States Postal Service cycling team are accused of defrauding the government by allowing doping on the squad when the team’s contract with the Postal Service explicitly forbade it,” according to the Times.
While Herman denied that Armstrong has talked to Travis Tygart, USADA’s chief executive, the Times cites sources who say otherwise. In addition to Tygart, whom he spoke to in “an effort to mitigate the lifetime ban he received for playing a lead role in doping on his Tour-winning teams,” the source says Armstrong has also met with David Howman, the current director general of the World Anti-Doping Agency. According to the World Anti-Doping Agency’s code, athletes who admit to guilt may be eligible for a reduced punishment.
Via